You’ve just finished building your ETABS structural model.
It may be a huge
multi-level high-rise building or a simple low-rise structure. Either way, you
have spent time and effort building your future structure as a three dimensional
representation and its ready to run for the very first time. With the click of a
button you run the analysis and the anticipation is palpable. The analysis
finishes and there is a warning… “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned”, your
heart sinks, does this mean your structure will collapse? You were so careful
with your meshing and snapping too. What should you do next?…
The error “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned” is a warning that is
produced by ETABS after the structure has been analysed. The warning is
generally caused by a member which produces a loss of accuracy of 11 digits or
more during the analysis. An excessive loss of digits beyond 11 is regarded as
too inaccurate for analysis purposes and should be investigated and rectified by
the designer.
If you receive the error message in ETABS “structure is unstable or ill-
conditioned”, you should not proceed any further. Do not use any results
which that model has produced. In all likelihood the results may be be orders
or magnitude wrong. This is true for all results including deflection, stress,
forces and base reactions. You should absolutely fix this error before moving
to the next step in your analysis. So how do we fix this? Lets take a closer
look…
The structure is unstable or ill-conditioned!! Check the structure carefully for:
– Inadequate support conditions, or
– One or more internal mechanisms, or
– Zero or negative stiffness properties, or
– Extremely large stiffness properties, or
– Buckling due to P-Delta or geometry nonlinearity, or
– A frequency shift (if any) onto a natural frequency
ETABS Software – Maybe for your latest model you’ve just analysed
First I’m going to give you the quick answer so you can go away and critique
your own model and fix your issue as fast as possible. Then I’m going to go
through a real example on a project I’m working on to show you a step by step
process of how I solve this issue myself.
Steps for fixing the “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned” warning message:
Make sure you are running the Standard Solver within ETABS as this
produces the most detailed instability data
Open the error/warning log (found in the same folder location as the ETABS
*.edb file)
Identify the locations which have a loss of accuracy of 11 digits or more
Navigate to these locations within your model using the x, y and z coordinates
provided.
Thoroughly inspect the location for abnormalities in the modelling including
elements not snapped together and irregular mesh.
Once all locations have been rectified, re-run the analysis using the standard
solver to ensure all instabilities have been fixed.
Running the Correct Analysis for Identifying Locations where Structure is
Unstable or Ill-Conditioned.
If you have encountered this message and you did not use the “Standard
Solver” for your analysis, the very first thing you need to do is re-run your
analysis using the “Standard Solver” immediately (if you already used the
Standard Solver and know the difference between the solvers, skip to the next
section, if not, continue reading)…
in ETABS, there are three different solver options. These are found by
navigating to…
Analyze >> Advanced SAPFire Options…
The three possible options with an explanation for each is as follows…
Advanced SAPFire Options dialog box in ETABS. The solver type you
choose from determines how hard it will be to track down where your structure
is unstable or ill-defined.
Multi-threaded Solver (Don’t use this one)
This is the fastest solver out of all the options. It uses multiple cores in your
machines GPU to solve the analysis and also uses a large amount of RAM.
This is the reason why the multi-threaded solver runs so fast, but this comes at
a cost… It gives almost no instability information. This means that if your
receiving the error that your structure is unstable or ill-defined, it will be like
trying to find a needle in a haystack as to where the issue is!!! This solver is best
used when you have already ran your model a few times and are confident that
it is stable and free from major issues or warnings.
For more information about “how to check if your ETABS model is correct”
and outputting logical answers, take a look at THIS article.
Advanced Solver (Don’t use this one)
The advanced solver uses multiple cores in your GPU to solve the analysis
similarly to the multi-threaded solver. Its a little easier on the RAM however so
it takes a little longer to run. It does provide a little more information on
instabilities and errors in your model, however still not that useable, especially
if your error is “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned”.
Standard Solver (!! Use this one !!)
The standard solver is the one you are after for resolution of instabilities. It
does however take the longest time to run. The trade off though is that you
receive a lot more information and exact locations of the instability. This
makes it much easier to fix your model and move on to the next stage of your
design.
The dreaded error warning message from ETABS “structure is unstable or ill-
conditioned”. This is from an example model, the error log can be found in
the same location as the model file once the analysis is completed.
Reading the Error and Warning Log in ETABS once the Analysis is Finished.
Now that we have ran the standard solver, we now need to locate the position
of our instabilities (or instabilities depending on how bad your model is!!).
For this you need to access the error and warning log after ETABS has
finished analysing your building. The error log is found in the same location as
your model file (*.ebd file) for the model you’ve just analysed.
Once open, scroll down to the section that starts with…
** Warning***
NUMERICAL PROBLEMS ENCOUNTERED DURING EQUATION
SOLUTION:
ETABS – Maybe for the latest model you’ve just analysed
A list of the inaccuracies and “loss of digits then follows. It may look a little bit
like this…
Example extract from the error and warning output log once ETBAS has
finished analysing. This portion is a handy tool to help locate where structure is
unstable or ill-conditioned occurs.
Lets take a look at what each column represents…
Column Explanation
Type The type of element with the loss of accuracy associated with it. For example joint.
Label The unique label name for this element in question
DOF The degree of freedom for the error (UX, UY, UZ or RX, RY, RZ etc.)
X-Coord The x-coordinate where the loss of accuracy exists
Y-Coord The y-coordinate where the loss of accuracy exists
Z-Coord The z-coordinate where the loss of accuracy exists
The issue with the element in question (for example, most commonly “Lost
Problem
accuracy”)
Value** The value of the error (for example number of digits lost)
For the “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned” error, the “value” column is
the first important piece of information (hence the double asterisk). Lets take a
look at this one first…
When you press the run button in ETABS its analysis calculates the stiffness
matrix and other calculations on your building with an accuracy of 16 digits.
When poor modelling practice is used, or when the analysis involves systems
of significantly different stiffness, digits of accuracy can be “lost”.
Some loss of accuracy is normal and common for most computational software
packages. However when the loss of accuracy becomes excessive, this can
indicate that something is wrong with your structure or the modelling is
incorrect.
Here is a summary for the range of digits lost in your analysis:
Less than 6 Digits Lost: The analysis is reasonably accurate. So much so that
ETABS will not report on a loss of digits of 6 or less.
Between 6 and 11 Digits Lost: This can start to indicate an issue at various
locations in your model. However most of the time they are of little concern,
especially if the value is in the 6 or 7 range. Value closer to 11 should be highly
scrutinised, however all values should be looked at with a keen eye (use
engineering judgement!). If you are unsure your model is correct, take a look
at THIS article which gives you some handy tips on how to ensure that you can
rely upon the answers your ETABS model is producing.
Over 11 Digits Lost: This is regarded as excessive loss of accuracy to the point
where the results produced are likely erroneous. It is these locations which you
should be most interested in and track down what is causing the issue. It is
these locations causing the “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned” warning
within ETABS.
The process now is to pinpoint the location of each excessive loss of accuracy
using the x, y and z coordinate information in the warning log. Simply navigate
visually to the location and then inspect the region thoroughly for anything that
looks odd. This may include:
Meshing which doesn’t make sense, too small or too irregular
A member which is a mechanism. For example a cantilever beam with an end
release where it should be fixed.
Pins at mid-span on members (this commonly occurs for columns which are
spanning double or triple height).
Members aren’t properly snapped to one another therefore not structurally
connected in the eyes of ETABS.
The possible causes are really quite varied. Because of this, lets go through an
example I encountered recently on a model I was performing a design check
on…
Example “Structure is Unstable or Ill-conditioned “Scenario
Lets look at an example project I’m currently looking at. Its located in
Brisbane Australia. The general specs of the building is 24 storey height, office
building, relatively small floor plates (770m2) with an eccentric core. Here is
an ETABS snapshot of the typical office floor plate (3D perspective view of an
isolated single floor plate)…
Typical floor plated isolated in view on an example project with ETABS
model showing the warning “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned”
I’ve now run the analysis and I’m getting the dreaded “structure is unstable or
ill-conditioned”. Here is the warning and also the location of accuracy loss
more than 11 digits…
“Structure is unstable or ill-conditioned” error output with corresponding
locations where loss of accuracy is 11 digits or more in the ETABS analysis.
Here I have three instances of excessive accuracy loss but only two locations.
The bottom two instances appear to occur at the same joint however are giving
errors for two different degrees of freedom, UX and UZ. Lets take a look at
this location first. Here is that joint isolated in the model viewer…
Example joint causing an instability error in ETABS.
I’ve turned joint labels on here to pinpoint the exact location. The joint in
question is number 642. There doesn’t’ appear to be anything sinister going
on. The joint corresponds with a joint in the frame member spanning up and
down the screen. There is no end release at this joint so the member should be
stable. However this joint is actually redundant for the purposes of the beam.
To try and solve the instability error, I will remove this joint which is
apparently not required. Here is what it now looks like…
Example joint which was producing instability error now removed, this fixed
the “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned” at this specific location.
The joint is now gone. After re-running the model, this instability warning is
now gone as well.
Lets take a look at the next warning location. It is at the corner of the eccentric
core…
Second joint example indicating instability in ETABS
Here we can see that the two walls at the corner of this core are not joined
adequately. There are two ways to tell this, firstly the wall hasn’t automatically
squared off at the corner acknowledging that the two walls join, also there are
overlapping joint name labels, this indicates that there are two joints in very
close proximity to each other.
Turning the unique joint names on in your model view is a great way to see
snapping errors such as this. It wasn’t exactly clear why these walls weren’t
touching, in all other levels at this location the snapping of the walls worked
fine. I was able to fix this issue by re-drawing the wall running in the left-right
direction for thsi level only. Here is what it looked like after the fix…
The same example joint in ETBS now properly snapped. This eliminated the
instability error.
Now here is the really interesting part and the best evidence as to why you
shouldn’t let the “structure is unstable or ill-conditioned” error stay in your
model. Here is a comparison of the overall core reactions at the base of the
building for dead load only…
Vertical Moment Moment
Result P M2 M3
(kN) (kNm) (kNm)
With Instability Errors -97,229 52,671 45,724
Without Instability Errors -89,666 68,713 34,802
Comparison Difference (%) 7.7% 23% 24%
These differences in results are hardly small and can result in significant errors
in wall thickness, reinforcement and foundation assumptions in the model and
potentially for the built structure! This is the reason why you should always
check your work and perform all necessary QA procedures which involves
allowing other Structural Engineers to spot check your work also.
